Sadamu Shimomura

Sadamu Shimomura (23 September 1887-25 March 1968) was last Minister of War of Japan (from August to December 1945), succeeding Naruhiko Higashikuni.

Biography
Sadamu Shimomura was born on 23 September 1887 in Kochi Prefecture, Japan. He graduated from the Imperial Japanese Army Academy in 1908, and he graduated from the Army Staff College in 1916. In 1919, he was sent to France as a military attache, and he attended the 1928-1929 and 1931 Geneva Naval Conference negotiations in Switzerland.

In 1935, he was sent to join the staff of the Kwantung Army, and he was promoted to Major-General in 1936. He was a proponent of aggressive operations against the Kuomintang in the Shanghai area, and he was a major strategist during the Second Sino-Japanese War. In 1942, he was given command of the Japanese Thirteenth Army in Shanghai, and he was given command of the North China Area Army in 1944. On 23 August 1945, he was promoted to Army Minister after the Japanese surrender at the end of World War II; because he never fought against the United States in the war, he was considered a good choice for War Minister. He oversaw the demobilization of the Imperial Japanese Army and was briefly imprisoned from 1946 to 1947, being released without charges. In June 1959, he was elected to the House of Councilors for a single term with the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan. He died in a traffic accident in 1968.